Falls Church Chamber of Commerce leader Andrew Painter moderated one of three panels on the economic prospects of Arlington County going forward held in Crystal City Tuesday.
Panelists at the conference produced by Bisnow, a New York-based business to business platform that generates scores of such events across the U.S. annually, generally engaged in painting lipstick on the calamity pig of Trump layoffs that are hitting the county with its 25,000 federal workers.
Already with a 26.7 percent office vacancy rate, the county is bracing as fully 20 percent of its currently occupied office space is leased to the federal General Services Administration. As Ryan Touhill, Arlington Economic Development director, said at the event, “Let’s face it, our regional economic development model is under major disruption right now.”
But the up side for future development was otherwise emphasized on the panels.
Painter’s panel featured Arlington County Board Chair Takis Karatonis, Arlington Chamber President and CEO Kate Bates, Orr Partners Founder David Orr, and National Landing BID President Tracy Gabriel.
The conference was called “Exploring Arlington County’s Next Chapter.” Painter’s panel was called “Transforming Neighborhoods: Site Selection, Infrastructure and Economic Growth.” Other panels were titled, “The Future of Office Development in Arlington” and “Innovating Arlington: A Placemaking & Redevelopment Story.”
The Painter panel discussion, Painter told the News-Press, covered wide-ranging topics such as Arlington’s response to federal government actions, affordable housing, predictability and transparency of Arlington County’s zoning and permitting review processes, and more. Painter summarized the discussion as follows:
It was noted that the County has a fairly transparent and predictable zoning approval process, which removes some of the guesswork in terms of capital outlays needed for investment and dollars spent pursuing zoning entitlements.
Also discussed was the impact of Arlington’s placemaking efforts (e.g., emphasis on pedestrian connectivity, environmental sustainability, and transit-oriented development) over the past several decades as part of its economic development approach. Namely, the fact that Arlington has focused on such efforts has resulted in communities which are more resilient and can better attract commercial uses (because mixed-use is the new paradigm in prime commercial real estate).
These advantages helped the County land Amazon’s second headquarters, and allow it to keep attracting talent. Young professionals (and professionals of all ages) are attracted to walkable, vibrant, transit adjacent/proximate mixed-use communities—which is one of Arlington’s advantages. To that end, the National Landing community is seeking to diversify away from federal government leases and focusing on high technology with Amazon and the new Virginia Tech campus.
All of this will allow Arlington to better withstand economic pressures created by federal government layoffs and budget cuts. The panel also discussed the County’s proactive actions to reduce its commercial vacancy rate, including allowing additional uses under the zoning ordinance and fast-tracking adaptive reuse of obsolete or vacant commercial office buildings.
It was also noted that the County does not seek per-pupil contributions for schools with new development, because the County recognizes that the taxes generated by new projects more than offset the cost of providing services to the new residents.
